The German critic Bertholt Brecht wrote that “One may say that tragedy deals with the sufferings of mankind in a less serious way than comedy.” In this class, we will test this thesis by exploring the use of humor to tell stories of personal or social trauma in modern U.S. literature. We will also see how some critics have approached the mystery of what makes us laugh, and why laughter and tears seem to run so close together. We’ll consider multiple genres and modes of literary humor, like satire and parody, and we will consider what, if anything, is distinctive about “American” humor.
Required Readings
Besides the readings on Blackboard, these will be available for sale at Barnes and Noble on campus. Buy them there, or wherever you prefer to buy books.
Paul Beatty, ed. Hokum: An Anthology of African-American Humor
Fran Ross, Oreo
Joseph Heller, Catch-22
Junot Díaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
Course Schedule
All readings should be completed before class on the day noted. Readings marked with an * can be found in Hokum. Readings in italics should be completed by graduate students in the class, and are optional for everyone else.
Jan. 9
Hannah Arendt, “Hannah Arendt: From an Interview,” New York Review of Books, Oct. 26, 1978
E.B. White, from the Preface to A Subtreasury of American Humor
Carter Revard, “The Secret Verbs”
Patricia Lockwood, “Is Your Country a He Or a She in Your Mouth?”
Peanuts, October 19, 1975
Jan. 11
Sigmund Freud, “Humor”
* Sterling Brown, “Slim at Atlanta”
* W.E.B. Du Bois, “On Being Crazy”
To watch in class: Drunk History, “Harriet Tubman”
Jan. 16
Simon Critchley, On Humor, chapter 1
* H. Rap Brown on the dozens, pp. 56-59
Yiddish Radio Project, “A Selection of Curses”
To view in class: Joan Rivers—a selection of her red-carpet insults
Jan. 18:
* Paul Beatty, “Introduction,” Hokum
Writing workshop
NB: Mon, Jan 22 is the last day to withdraw from classes with tuition cancellation.
Jan. 23:
Henri Bergson, “Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic,” chapter 1, sections I, II, and V
Watch in class: excerpts from Modern Times (Charlie Chaplin, 1936)
Your assignment: bring in your favorite GIF for analysis
Lauren Berlant and Sianne Ngai, “Comedy Has Issues,” Critical Inquiry 43:2
Jan. 25:
Eric Lott, Love and Theft, pp. 3-5, 15-21
The Daily Show, “Reminder: Race is Not a Costume”
Chappelle’s Show: “The Racial Draft”
WE1 due: Why should Henri Bergson laugh at your GIF?
Jan. 30
* Bert Williams jokes
* Zora Neale Hurston, “Possum or Pig?”
* Elizabeth Alexander, “Talk Radio, DC”
Quiz on literary terms and concepts
Feb. 1
Joel Chandler Harris, Legends of the Old Plantation (excerpts)
Charles Chesnutt, “The Goophered Grapevine,” “Po’ Sandy”
Feb. 6
Chesnutt, “Dave’s Neckliss”
Glenda Carpio, “Black Humor in the Conjure Stories”
Feb. 8
Chesnutt, “The Passing of Grandison”
Feb. 10: WE2 (Why must Charlie Brown never kick the football?) due on Blackboard
Feb. 13
Dorothy Parker, “Interview,” “Love Song,” “Resumé,” “Little Words”
Watch: Saturday Night Live, “Debbie Downer: Thanksgiving Dinner”
Feb. 15
Joseph Heller, Catch-22
Feb. 20
Heller, Catch-22
Feb. 22
Heller, Catch-22
Feb. 27
Flannery O’Connor, “Everything that Rises Must Converge”
WE3: Keyword analysis due in class
Mar. 1
Fran Ross, Oreo
Mar. 6
Fran Ross, Oreo
Mar. 8
* Malcolm X, “Message to the Grass Roots”
“The Ballot or the Bullet,” King Solomon Baptist Church, Detroit, MI, April 12, 1964 (please listen to the recording here).
Workshop on outlines: please bring a reverse outline of WE3
March 13-15: Spring break
Mar. 20
Mandatory screening: When Jews Were Funny (dir. Allen Zweig)
Mar. 22: No class meeting: final paper rough drafts due
April 3
Zweig discussion; begin The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
April 5
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
April 10
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
April 12
Lauren Michelle Jackson, “We Need to Talk About Digital Blackface in Reaction GIFs” Teen Vogue
Brandy Monk-Payton, “#LaughingWhileBlack: Gender and the Comedy of Social Media Blackness,” Feminist Media Histories
April 17
Sianne Ngai, “The Zany Science,” from Our Aesthetic Categories
“Parks and Recreation,” from season 2, episode 10: “Leslie Gets Grilled by Local Sheriff”
Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In, “Ernestine the Telephone Operator Calls General Motors”
Excerpts from I Love Lucy, “Job Switching”
April 19
Luis Valdez, Los Vendidos
final project workshop
Assignments:
Close-reading exercise #1: GIF analysis
Length: at least 1 double-spaced page
In “Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic,” Henri Bergson repeats a central image ofhis theory of what makes us laugh: “something mechanical encrusted on the living.” We laugh, he says, “when a person gives us the impression of being a thing.” Write a one-page analysis of a funny GIF that relates Bergson’s criteria to explain what about it makes you laugh. You may, if it helps–and if you know–consider the source material for your GIF. You may also consider it in context, i.e., as a reaction to a particular social-media conversation.
Writing exercise #2: Charlie Brown’s football
Length: At least two double-spaced pages
This exercise continues to practice the skill we developed in WE1: using critical tools to analyze cultural texts. In this case, I want you to make an argument not just about why Charlie Brown’s endless struggle against Lucy and her football is funny, but what the significance of the humor is. Is this cartoon about gender politics and sexism, and if so, how do you read Lucy’s character and her motives? Is it a nihilistic warning against ambition and the inevitability of our disappointment, or a sympathetic portrayal of an indomitable underdog? Consider one of the theorists of humor we’ve discussed already (Arendt/Brecht, Freud, Critchley, Carpio, or Bergson) and make a concise, detailed argument about what Charlie Brown’s struggle is, why it is important, and why it is important to address it in the form of a joke. For this assignment, closely analyze the plot and language of at least two Peanuts cartoons—you are encouraged to read as many as you can find, of course.
Close-reading exercise #3: keyword analysis
Length: at least 2-3 double-spaced pages
This paper develops close reading skills by focusing your attention on a very specific piece of textual evidence. Here I want you to narrow your focus to a single word. Identify a keyword from any of the primary texts we have read thus, and use it to make an argument about its significance in the text. You might prefer to focus on a poem, which because of poetry’s economy of language and its emphasis on wordplay often rewards a close reading of a particular word or specific line, but you can also examine one of the prose works we’ve read thus far.
What is a keyword? Think about the word “key” in both of its senses: as something of great importance and as a tool that opens up a room to closer examination. The Oxford English Dictionary defines “keyword” in these ways, as “a word serving as a key to a cipher or the like” and as “a word or thing that is of great importance or significance.” The literary scholar Raymond Williams described keywords as “binding words,” terms that draw together related concepts and themes.
The word you choose may be important because it establishes a central metaphor or symbol. It could be important because other terms refer back to it. It may draw your attention because it is a particularly ambiguous term, whose meaning demands interpretation; conversely it might stick out because it only appears inconsequential or straightforward on first glance. It might be used consistently, or its meaning might change in an important way which your paper might trace. You are free (indeed, encouraged) to quote from the text, even parts of the poem that do not include your keyword, as long as you explain why you are doing so.
The keyword you choose may be simple, or complex; it could be a multisyllabic word or it could be a little tiny pronoun. It could be repeated (in which case you would want to discuss the repetition) or it could only appear once. You should provide a dictionary definition only if a definition will help you get at something not immediately apparent in the text. If you do, cite the Oxford English Dictionary. Your paper should use your keyword to help you answer an interpretive question, which will be in first paragraph.
Keywords: The New Language of Capitalism 